A Dive Into the Atlantic
by sm8430328
Summary: When you are the only one left standing, what should you do? Gemini, for the life of her, can't decide on her own. So without a definite answer to an undefined question, she finds she has no choice but to dive into the unknown.


Disclaimer: I do not own Sakura Wars.

EDIT: Oh gosh, I forgot to put a dedication! Can't forget my dedication!

This fic is dedicated to... um... my mom. Yeah, her.

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><p>With fiery energy, they land on the streets.<p>

Their STARs emit a radiant glow, feeding off their pilot's steadfast courage, or perhaps their unwavering resolve to spite evil. They aspire to create a safe world, to demonstrate the correct ways to the future inheritors of the Earth.

The citizens know this as they observe the two youths, one boy and one girl, from their shelter. Perhaps they resent leaving the fate of their city, and possibly their entire planet, to people so young, but they do not speak of it. They know that if they were to be in their shoes, they would wish for support. So they sit in their misshapen cots and whisper among themselves, waiting earnestly for the time when the final blow to the enemy was delivered and they could return home.

They always expect victory to be on their side. They always expect what they want, because that is how they were raised to be. It isn't their fault.

不問

She enters the cockpit. It feels warm inside, like a new dress tailor-made for her, or her master's smile when she championed a new technique. The buttons and screens and levers in front of her look complicated, but she is somehow able to understand the functions of each one. Her hands, gloved in her new uniform, probe instinctively into the sockets in front of her. Her mind flits onto unsheathing her sword, and suddenly the robot heeds her, swinging the blade like the samurai she aimed to be. Satisfied with the utilities of her new STAR, she sits back in the plush seat as the many platforms outside move to carry her to wherever they would.

Anticipation flows through her veins towards her beating heart, which pumps it out again to continue the cycle. She smiles through the communication screen at her friend, now fellow warrior. They exchange short words of good luck, smile some more, and let the platforms launch them outside to the theater's entrance.

The pride of having finally reached the same rank of her friends slaughters all rationality in her. Adrenaline blocks out the ringing warning bells, the ones that rightfully say that the danger might be too much for her unpracticed hands. The only thing she sees with her tunnel vision is the celebration that would follow the battle. That's all she's ever seen.

She's never seen death, loss and mourning. If she has, she's forgotten it all.

興奮

The pseudo-bunny laughs as he watches them battle against his robots. They haven't figured out the location of their friends yet. They don't think to fly around the community to try and find them, no. They settle on destroying as many enemies as possible. Perhaps they think that the carnage of his fallen soldiers would make him surrender and hand their friends over, as if he had just waved a white flag.

They are ignorant and insolent. This isn't some video game, you know.

自信

The Harlemite is the first to go. She's always had the shortest health bar as well as the shortest temper. When the generators eat up the last morsel of energy she has, she just vanishes along with her STAR. Not in the regular shower of white sparkles, but as a passive gust of wind, a wind that carries the underlying message: Goodbye.

Next is the doctor. She whispers a couple of lines of Macbeth as she vaporizes, a cool wave of water darkening the pavement underneath.

The child makes a louder farewell, swiping out a gun artfully hidden underneath her uniform and attempting to shoot her way out of the STAR, but to no avail. She is swallowed by the ground, leaving pile of earth in her stead.

Final is the enigma, disappearing in a thin wisp of black light. Typical of her character, she makes no effort to escape. It would have been impossible, anyway, even with her genius.

If they are alive or dead, nobody can prove. To any investigator, it would appear they just disappeared off the alleys of Manhattan.

死去

The duo is unaware of their recent losses as they continue their fight. Swords continue clashing with the metal coating of the foe, sending hot sparks flying into the clear night sky. Yells of triumph and cries of pain echo through the atmosphere, resonating louder than the advice from those in the theater. Not that they listen to the speakers, anyway. The action is too intense for that.

The road is now littered with more than just chewing gum and theater flyers, but with debris and robot parts and it's also cracked, defaced by its own inhabitants. There is no sign of an advantage for either side of the war. Their forces, despite the number, have equal power. After all, there are really three human brains, not just two, on the battlefield.

That is, until the demon introduces his ace in the hole.

The design is the same deformed rabbit as it was before, but with double the fear factor. The structure is better than it once was, with more enforcing beams, the weapons are more powerful, and the heal tank is practically indestructible. There is a hint of chrome on the plating, leaving it shiny as a freshly cut diamond. The mech hovers above, propellers buzzing to distract its prey from the deadly staff in its clutches. It is a downright monstrous weapon, fit to kill. And kill it does.

Before he could even transform into flight mode, the Captain is struck down, leaving nary a hint of his existence that had just been so cruelly taken away.

And now there is but one left.

一人

Anger consumes her, understandably. The one that might have been her love had just dematerialized right in front of her, for the sake of every hamburger ever made!

Choosing to ignore any possible consequence, she rushes at the demon boy himself, sword's point dead parallel to the horizon line.

怒り

She is still unaware of how she ever did it. The demon had been defeated, by her and her alone. Should she be glad of this fact, bask in the glory of ascendancy?

No.

The death of nearly every friend she had ever made in New York makes her break down every time the thought of it crosses her mind.

有罪

When it comes to these kinds of things, there are two kinds of people. There is the cunning kind that blames the deaths on others, no matter how unjustly so.

And then there is the noble type that blame it on themselves, because they think there is no soul as black as theirs to have played a part in a loved one's death.

She is, unfortunately, the latter type. There really is no reason for it other than the overwhelming influence the bravery of her friends had on her. She is certain if they had been where she is now, they would have acted the same way. Not that she knew her friends all that well. They had not known each other for very long.

Still, they were friends. And she would never forgive herself for the fact that she'd never see them again.

決して

A week later, she's yet to recover. Her twin's not talking anymore, the horse lives at the Commander's, and the apartment is cluttered and dusty. The occupant herself looks like she's been run over by a poultry truck.

She opens her eyes, sky blue and cryptically unfeeling. Sitting up from her rumpled bed, she runs a hand through her red hair, dull and tangled. She walks, or slouches, rather, to the window nearby, and glances at the sun above, to make sure it's risen and the new day has indeed started. Having confirmed this, she sits unproductively on the floor.

The sun would set and she goes back to bed.

憂鬱

That night she has a dream (it's always a dream, isn't it?) Or perhaps it's a vision, or an illusion, or maybe it's really happening. She cannot be sure.

She finds herself in a white space; a plethora of pink bubbles floating upwards, the kind children blow out through the imaginatively shaped sticks. She's sitting on a cloud, clad in a white bathrobe. Her skin is clean and slightly moist, as if she had just taken a bath. It is calm.

They begin appearing, one at a time. The lawyer comes first, dark and tall and manly, an incongruous smile for her persona on her face. The bespectacled is second, sweet, empathetic and heavenly. The Mexican gunslinger arrives third, grinning blithely with no food in her teeth, for once. And the androgynous is last, looking very much like she had always looked. All wear white dresses.

It's the kind of moment when words like to fail you and thoughts like to manipulate you. First they hold your mouth open as wide as your muscles allow, and push your eyes wider than plates. Then they force your eyelids to cover them and your mouth to close, and etch your face into a look of deep thought. They then proceed to unceremoniously pry your eyes open again and twist your mouth into... a smile.

A smile. The first time she's sported one for – she can't count the time!

The child of the group wordlessly pulls the five into the warmest hug in history.

"How've you been?" the black one asks. She's still smiling.

"We've been really worried about you. You haven't been eating lately, have you? It's important to eat right and get some fresh air once in a while!" the blue one chastises, though she does not seem all too serious.

The purple one just smirks.

"Hello!" the green one exclaims, jumping off the – there is no ground.

That's when she realizes they all have wings. She vocalizes this fact.

"So do you," they say.

She does not have time to ponder this development, however, because a voice, deeper that the others', sounds from over her shoulder.

He says her name.

She tries to turn around, but can't. She fears that if she does, this little fantasy would crumble and she'd return to the world too miserable for her innocent soul. So she stays rooted, no, floating, on the spot, and lets him continue talking.

"We've all agreed on this. Don't keep doing this to yourself. You have to get over us and be happy. Once you've moved on, we'll be satisfied. We don't care how you do it, okay?" His voice manages to be stern and gentle at the same time. It nearly makes her cry to learn her friends would care so much about her.

She finally manages to find her voice, which she hadn't even noticed had left her, and croaks.

"Of course."

Black engulfs the world.

友達

She wakes up, and it's morning again. The sun is in the sky again. And the light is back in her heart.

She remembers her dream, or illusion or vision, very clearly. She can recall every detail of her friend's faces, every word they had said. So she has no excuse not to respect their wishes.

The first thing she does is clean up her living space. She puts everything in its place and dusts the furniture until it looks just the way it had when the landlord had offered it to her. She puts on some clean clothes for the first time in a long time. They feel soft. She runs off to the Commander's mansion and picks up her horse from the jovial man, who is very happy to see her out of her hovel, and tells her the second-in-command has rejoined the combat crew and he's currently searching for those with high enough Pneuma to join, and that she should tell him if she knows of anyone. She agrees cheerfully and runs back to the Village with her horse, who neighs and whinnies and snorts in his happiness of seeing his partner again.

She then visits the theater and says hi to everyone there. The bartender and seamstress give her food and she eats greedily, chomping like the child. She finishes, passing by the Vice Commander, who greets her, and rushes to the harbor.

All that work done in one hour. She might feel proud... but she's not sure of her emotions anymore.

急ぐ

She knows not what drives her to do it. In fact, she doesn't care. She just... knows... it's the only way to get over them.

She does not intend to get herself killed, of course. She just wants to get wet, feel the cold water cooling her, contrasting the heat of the fading summer-early fall weather. To feel the liquid seeping through her clothes and then against her skin, cleansing her, freeing her of her sins. That's all she wants.

She goes to the edge of the pier, glancing placidly at the braided girl's past house as she waltzes past, and, making sure no one is watching, jumps.

The sensation is exactly the same as she had predicted, only more afflictive. She screams. There are knives piercing her ribcage, there's salt in her eyes and her clothes are weighing her down. She doesn't feel like expending the energy required to be able to breathe again. But she has to, or she'll die and they'll all be ashamed of her. So she pulls all her love for them (especially him) from her heart and into her arms and legs. That love, turned physical energy, is the only thing that prevents her from drowning. She breaks the surface, then climbs back up and dries off in the warehouse.

She repeats this action for five weeks – a week for each person.

It cannot be good for her health, but each day she dives double the times she did the previous day; one, then two, then four, and so on. She believes it will make her "stronger", or so she tells the seamstress when she notices she's been disappearing for periods of time.

強さ

The thirty-fifth day came and went. She feels (or not?) relieved that she doesn't have to suffer anymore, but denies the thought immediately. It would disgrace her friends if they knew she didn't really want to dive into freezing water for their sakes.

Is she stronger now? She asks the stones, erected amongst others not a fortnight ago.

If the question was left to herself, she'd probably say yes. One does not jump into excruciatingly cold water every day and not see a result. Though she hadn't forgotten her friends, she'd accepted their demises. A happy medium, in her humble opinion.

They do not respond, of course. She never expected anything from them, anyway. Her own opinion is enough to satisfy her. So she turns around and heads for the graveyard's exit, thinking of how she's evolved during her "training", and how she'd never stop loving her friends, and also of her horse.

That's when a voice, his voice, calls out from behind her.

"Gemini."

終わり

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><p>AN: Hello, awesome reader who clicked my story! It's my first one that ever exceeded 500 words. No joke!

I personally am not too fond of this fic. The ending sucks, but you might think differently, so yeah. I thought mentioning a name only at the end would be kinda avant-garde, but I wanna know if it seems that way to you. Was it too confusing? Is my grammar okay? Did you see a pairing? Should I have put a pairing? Did you enjoy it? I can't gauge the quality of my own writing very well, so I'll need you guys to help me! I really really want to improve my writing! Feedback is very appreciated, no matter what it says. So please review!

Bye-ni!

/ /Novaki/ /

Responses to reviews:

James Birdsong: Hi! I've seen you review pretty much every ST fic on this site, anon. Pretty amazing feat! I think I saw somewhere that you did have an account, so I'll go look you up later. Also, thanks for your review! Peace out!


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